OK, now that another "crisis" has passed, I have been able to calm down and ponder some deep philosophical questions.
What truly is superior intelligence and humanity's take on that subject? Really now. I am starting to wonder if it's all ego and a cruel joke on the human race.
As many of you who may read this already know, I am the sole caregiver (for a variety of reasons, but primarily a promise to a dead loved one) for a woman who has Alzheimer's and the disease is progressing rapidly. She is now at the severe stages of dementia and it's getting contagious I fear. I think I'm loosing it a tad. (OK, for those that really know me, maybe more than a tad - I'm freakin loopy)!
This once sweet, endearing, proud Scottish, intelligent, hell-on-wheels military wife, mother, office manager and church going woman is but an empty shell that is an eating, sleeping, peeing and pooping paper weight. Early this morning on a random trip to the bathroom (yes she still gets around with a walker or sometimes without and even crawls when I am not on the constant vigil or watching 24/7 doing household chores and such things as sleeping poorly) I decided to investigate after hearing her whisper to herself "Oh My" over and over again only to find her sitting on the bathroom floor ripping out her hair in fist fulls from the roots, bleeding like a sieve and laffin to herself playing in the pools of blood and licking her lips.
OK - FREAK OUT TIME!!!!!! Do I call 911 or be the person I am and take care of the situation as a loving, caring, Certified First Responder and semi-professional? Option 2 worked out for the most part and the first aid and clean up job was complete by 4 AM (albeit bleary eyed, frazzled and exhausted). Unfortunately she had to be restrained for her own safety and was made as comfortable as possible so I could attempt to regenerate through some well needed sleep. Early this morning at sunrise I wake to check in and release the bindings because I feel gawd awful and she's sleeping like an angel.
Now this afternoon I dealt with a stark raving lunatic again tearing off her clothes and leaving pee puddles splashing all over the rug and walls as she hobbles to the bathroom in an effort to be somewhat human versus animal, vegetable or mineral.
This made me think - if she was anything other than human, she would no longer be living this empty shell of a life. I mean no malice in my thoughts but observations in life and nature really made me ponder are we as human beings really of superior intellect? Let's face it, in the animal kingdom, if she was a lion for example - King of the Jungle - she never would have made it the last 7 years. Never mind the fact that Eleanor has a pacemaker and a shunt in her brain, a botched bladder from surgery after a car accident 20 years ago. All the "intellect" acquired by the doctors that "fixed and repaired" her as best as they can and pharmaceuticals that are synthetically made and doled out like clockwork to "help slow down the progression of the disease" makes me wonder are we really smarter than the wild and the free in nature?
Animals eat, sleep, mate, work alone or in groups, survive by instincts and without intervention from the thinking process. Yes, their lives don't have the internet and material possessions but isn't that just the point? They don't need them so why do we? Why do we prolong a miserable existence for the sake of spending trillions on healthcare, research and "stuff"? Is it because we're human and are humane or just the total opposite and egotistical jerks that think?
We have more technology today for a plethora of things in order to "survive" yet are living in a box, watching a box, or blogging in a box rather than simply living life in peace and harmony with one another, looking out for potential dangers and enemies and simply exist no more when the natural cycle comes to an eventual end. We have everything we need if we have food, water and shelter, and someone to mate with (or several depending on what species). Hermits and survivors of shipwrecks stranded on remote islands prove that we can be resourceful in order to survive.
It's living life that escapes most of us. It's not quantity, it's quality and who in the hell gave us the moral standards to put an animal "down", but not a fellow suffering human being? I swear it's got to be ego because intelligent life is in the simple things... Mother Nature shows us that each and every moment. No matter how violent a storm, or catastrophic a natural disaster is, the sun still rises in the east, sets in the west, a full moon rises every 28 days, the stars still shine, rain waters the planet and provides for itself. There are no bullets, bombs, crime or national debt in the wild, simply "corrections" and natural occurrences of a still revolving world on this big blue marble of a planet we call Earth.
What's your take on this and please someone - just tell me I'm nuts and put me away in a nice cozy padded room so I can be another drain on society like so many others out here!
